Trans Global Migration
+27 11 807 9245/7
Trans Global Migration |
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Immigration policy has failed to deliverThe Ottawa Citizen Determining the appropriate number of immigrants that should be allowed into Canada each year is not a simple task. The number should be at a level that is good both for the immigrant and for the country. Since the introduction of the points system in the mid-1960s, we have had two quite different approaches. In the 1970s and 1980s, we had a system in which the number was determined largely on the basis of the current needs of the labour market -- the tap-on, tap-off approach. As labour market needs grew and shrank, the number of immigrants changed accordingly. For the last two decades, we have based the number around the idea of one per cent of total population (even if we haven't reached that level). Because the number exceeded the immediate needs of the labour market, the expectation was that in due course the economy would absorb those who could not find employment soon after arrival with the help of various settlement and integration programs. The results are clear. Immigrants arriving since 1990 fare less well than those who arrived earlier and, as a result, need considerable public support. To argue, as some do, that in the long term the current policy will benefit Canada, as long as we keep helping new immigrants integrate into the economy and society, is an admission that the current policy has yet to deliver on its promise. Close to two decades of experience suggests that the promise is unlikely to be realized and that a new approach is needed. Gerry Van Kessel, Aylmer Back to TG Migration Home |
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